Ecoversities Sixth Planetary Gathering in Egypt

Ecoversities Alliance

Salam! Ahlan! Hola! Hello! Ciao!

You are invited to come and meet the Ecoversities Alliance, a planetary gathering working to reclaim diverse knowledge ecologies and cosmologies, crafting decolonial and experiential approaches to learning and living. The event takes place on:

Date: Saturday, March, 19th

Time: from 5 to 9 pm

Place: Al-Khalifa Community Center (Address: Opposite of al-Saiyyda Ruqayya mausoleum, beside Sajar al-Durr dome, al-Ashraf St., al-Khalifa; Google Maps Link)

In partnership Megawra and Athar Lina Initiative, Mesahat: Liberating Learning Spaces and Cairo Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CILAS).

At the Ecoversities Alliance, we are group of over 1000 practitioners from around the world. We are educators, healers, farmers, storytellers, writers, builders, weavers, seekers, walk-outs, and believers in the possibilities of alternatives to the current packaged life and cracks in our existing systems.

Maybe at some point you felt a calling to do something different to this world and you started this journey. Whether you are feeling it inside or you have been manifesting things in the world for many years -come and join us.

Whether you are already working on a project that is around experimenting with or offering alternatives to re-imagine the education systems be it on grassroots or policy levels; or whether you are experimenting with regenerative living ecosystems, be it reclaiming a land outside the city, gardening on your rooftop, co-housing in a cooperative way in the middle of the city, reclaiming public space, building in ways that service our planet, innovating ways to find water, food and energy self-sufficiently; or whether you are working to reclaim diverse knowledge/indigneous systems be that connecting us to our place, land, territory, heritage and culture, maybe you do walking tours to learn while walking, or maybe you join and accompany people on journeys to the different ecosystems and indigenous sub-cultures in Egypt, maybe you revive the value of the hand, of manual labor and the beauty in the many Egyptian crafts we have, maybe you create arts in its different forms and shapes to invite people to a transformed collective consciousness and de-center the capitalist worldviews that dominate our world. Maybe you dream, question and want company from all around the world in that! All of this and much more is welcome. We want to see you, know you, build alliances with you, assemble and gather!

We want to invite you to a unique opportunity to get the vibe of this planetary community that is in 5 Continents. We are here in Egypt for the fifth Ecoversities Global Gathering. The land of the desert and the Oasis called us and we could not help but respond. We would like to share with you all a tea, coffee, some ideas on how can universities/education look like if they are in service of the land and the people? how can we walk-out from as well as open cracks in existing structures? how can heritage still be relevant, infact, be the compass? how can alivelihoods (rather than livelihoods) look like during this modern age? how can we learn-unlearn–relearn-reclaim other ways of being and existing on this world?

Some of the Ecoversities People and Projects at this event will be:

- Manish Jain, Founder of Swaraj University, Complexity University, Jail University & Shikshantar Andolan, Co-founder of Ecoversities Alliance, India. (https://www.shikshantar.org/.../my-unlearning-journey...)

- Sergio “Yeyo” Beltrán, co-founder of Unitierra, founder of Herramientas del Buen vivir, Co-founder of Ecoversities Alliance, Mexico (http://www.emergencenetwork.org/bio/sergio-beltran-arruti/ )

- Alessandra Pomarico, from Free Home University, M.E.D.U.SA,, Co-founder of Ecoversities Alliance, Italy (https://www.visibleproject.org/.../alessandra-pomarico/ )

- Aerin M. Dunford, co-founder The Emergence Network (globa), a member of the different Ecoversities working groups, USA/Mexico (https://www.conflicttransformationsummit.org/.../aerin... )

- Gerardo Lopez Amaro, Enlivened Cooperative, Mexico (https://www.sit.edu/sit_faculty/gerardo-lopez-amaro-ma/ )

- Chevanni Davids, co-founder Reimagined Learning Center, a member of the different Ecoversities working groups, South Africa (https://linktr.ee/CheReimagined )

- Our dear host on this territory Nariman Moustafa, from Mesahat: Liberating Learning Spaces, the Egypt Jam and the Cairo Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CILAS), a member of the different Ecoversities working groups, Egypt (https://sites.google.com/view/narimanmoustafa )

During the event we will:
- Share the story of ecoversities and how it came together
- Share examples and stories of ecoversities from around the world and listen to our Egyptian comrades and invite you to join us
- Exchange ideas around the questions that we have in this time of our life journeys and during this planetary moment in relation to this work of regenerative living and learning (world cafe format)
- Mingle, talk and exchange assembling with both ecoversities and other Egyptian projects that are attending

Date and time: Saturday, March 19th, 5 to 9 pm

Place: Al-khalifa Community Center (Facebook, Website)

Gift Economy basis:
The event is created based on a gift culture basis. If you are able to contribute financially to Ecoversities’ work, we would welcome this contribution, and it will help us support participants who are attending the Global Ecoversities Gathering as well as the space hosting this event.

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ABOUT ECOVERSITIES ALLIANCE:
The Ecoversities Alliance is a trans-local community of over 500 transformative learning spaces from around the world who have been meeting and working together since 2015 through international and regional gatherings, learning exchanges, campaigns, workshops, learning journeys, film festivals and publications.
It is an emerging knowledge movement that is slowly building all over the world.

A part of this movement can be described as a network of ‘eco-versities’—people, organizations, and communities who are reclaiming knowledge systems and a cultural imaginary to restore and re-envision learning processes that are meaningful and relevant to the challenges of our times.

Although diverse in its origins, these different pedagogical initiatives both critique the existing education systems, and cultivate new practices to regenerate ecological, social, and cultural ecosystems, whilst also reflecting on the meanings of ‘home’ as locality and as an ‘economy’: hence the name ‘eco-versities’.

To further the collaborations and intensify the relationships and the mutual learning among this wider network, the Eco-versities planetary gathering was organized by practitioners engaged in creating learning sites, both outside and inside the conventional academia. This will be the fifith ecoversities gathering held in-person.

Website: https://ecoversities.org/

Video from our last in-person gathering (2019):
https://ecoversities.org/ecoversities-planetary.../

Video on Ecoversities Dreaming: https://ecoversities.org/ecoversities-dreaming/